Stripping away our privacy

The disclosure that the government is experimenting with the use of backscatter X-ray technology in its screening of aviation passengers has produced considerable misgivings about the threat it poses to privacy and individual liberty. Backscatter technology will allow the production of photo quality images of passengers' naked bodies as if they were undressed. The nature of these images is such that most people would find them exceedingly invasive and may be particularly offensive to people of various ethnic or religious backgrounds.

The government has attempted to allay public concern by stating that the potential abuses of this security initiative will be curtailed by a variety of safeguards. The faces of individuals will be partly obscured, there will be no capability for printing, storing or transmitting the images, and the security officer examining the images will be located in a separate enclosed area thereby removing the images from public sphere.

These assurances have a hollow ring to them when a brief review of the war on terrorism provides a litany of systemic abuse of individual rights that cannot be ignored. Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and the persecution of Dr Mohammed Haneef are just a few of the multitude of egregious instances of misconduct committed by our public guardians claiming to protect us from the scourge of religious extremism.

In deciding the suitability of public safety initiatives that impinge on our basic human rights we must assume that to some extent abuse will occur and that it is a price we must be prepared to pay. It is, therefore, of fundamental importance that in all such cases the basic principles of necessity and proportionality should determine whether the particular measure can be justified as appropriate in a democratic society.

The case for introducing this technology has simply not been made out. Existing procedures can already adequately detect weapons and explosives carried by passengers, and there is no basis for asserting that this technology will enable that task to be done any more accurately.

So why do we require this technology which will conduct virtual strip searching of passengers? The answer appears to lie in the desire to make things easier for security personnel. The currently utilised procedures and protocols for electronic screening and physical examination of passengers and baggage involves considerable effort and is beset by false positives that require the hassle of secondary searches.

There can be no doubt that the public is willing to accept a reasonable amount of security scrutiny at airports but this should not be seen as giving governmental agencies free rein to treat people in a gratuitously degrading and disrespectful manner. The true test of a society's commitment to libertarian values is demonstrated by the extent to which it is prepared to support them in times of stress and conflict when the easier course is to revert to actions reflecting instinctive self-preservation motivated primarily by innate xenophobia.

Governmental security agencies have always undervalued the importance of fundamental civil liberties and human rights in a libertarian society. They all too often see these freedoms as obstacles to achieving their subjective perceptions of desirable social order. Electronic surveillance, warrantless searches, and preventive detention are promoted by the political rhetoric that only the guilty, those that have something to hide, need fear the use of these powers thereby attempting to marginalise the advocates of libertarian values to being misguided supporters of terrorism.

The evolution of libertarian democracy was not intended to replace authoritarianism with democratic despotism but rather to create a social environment in which the overall quality of human existence could be enhanced and the opportunity to achieve individual fulfillment could be pursued free of repression when they conflicted with the vested interests of the power elite.

Individual autonomy and privacy were fundamental ingredients in this new social formula that immeasurably increased the feeling of personal self-worth and dignity that everyone was entitled to.

The opposition to utilisation of this new X-ray technology at airports is a matter of great public importance. It constitutes another major assault on basic civil liberties that has been persistently pursued in various anti-terrorism acts and associated legislation since the events of 9/11. The outrage and fear that those terror attacks generated gave the government and their security apparatus a free pass to curtail our liberties purportedly for our own protection.

The time has now come that we make a stand and oppose this incremental creep against our fundamental liberties. If we allow this unnecessary and grossly invasive procedure to be implemented much of the remaining right to personal privacy and public dignity that we still possess will be stripped from us.

The adaptation of X-ray backscanner technology for security purposes was originally implemented for use in prisons. An environment where inmates are treated as objects to be processed and controlled. We need to be exceedingly vigilant that the basic disregard for individual dignity and privacy existing in our prisons does not become the norm for society by allowing broadened utilisation of this technology.

In the event that this technology becomes established at airports it will not be long before it is much more widely disseminated as a necessary security measure in other public and private situations.

The improper use of rapidly evolving technology as a grave threat to the fundamental rights and liberties of citizens is real and present danger that can not be rejected by glibly dismissing those who identify these dangers as paranoid conspiracy theorists who do not recognise the dangers we face. In this case the danger we face is clear. It is not from external enemies, but rather from our own government.